


Smile

by Heavenlea6292



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Lydia Martin, Break Up, Danny Mahealani & Lydia Martin Friendship, Divorce, F/M, Gen, Growing Up, Jackson/Lydia breakup, Lydia Martin Is So Done, POV Lydia Martin, Rebellious!Lydia, Self Confidence Issues, Teenage Rebellion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-18
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-27 10:57:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6281821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heavenlea6292/pseuds/Heavenlea6292
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She decides smiling is easier- until it isn't anymore.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smile

She doesn’t know how to talk to anyone. She never really made friends in pre-school, and she’s scared she won’t make any friends now.  
“Smile! Always smile!” Daddy coaches her.  
“Be yourself,” Mommy says encouragingly when she drops her off, but she doesn’t really know what that means.  
_Be yourself._  
What if they didn’t like herself? What would she do then? She decides smiling is easier.

Nothing Daddy tells her helps her make friends, but at least everyone is nice. They don’t like her, but they don’t want to get in trouble with the teacher. That’s okay, she decides, she can make them like her, like her Daddy makes people like him. She tries to bring the best snacks, she gives away her bracelet from Daddy when a girl says she likes it. The girl takes it- but the next day when Lydia wants to play on the swings with her, she says she’s busy. She doesn’t understand. She’s frustrated.  
And she does not want to be friends with any of them. 

* * *

  
She looks inside her valentine box, decorated with pink paper and glitter, sighing loudly. She looks up and sees Jackson putting a very fancy valentine- the one she saw him making in art- into another girl’s box. She puts her head down and cries- she was so sure he would give it to her, but she was wrong. She thought he liked her.  
She looks up when she hears someone standing in front of her desk, using the sleeve of her little mermaid sweat shirt to mop her eyes. She’s hopeful that maybe Jackson realized that he was putting the valentine in the wrong girl’s box, but it’s not him. It’s just Stiles. 

“Happy Valentine’s Day, Lydia!” he basically screams in her face before blushing and shoving a large construction paper heart under her nose. She takes it, smiling a little. Stiles is always nice to her. The valentine isn’t the prettiest, and it’s not as pretty as Jackson’s, but it’s the thought that counts, that’s what Mommy says.  
Daddy doesn’t like Stiles. Daddy likes Jackson- he and Jackson’s Daddy play golf together. 

“Thank you,” she says sweetly, giving him the widest smile she can manage. She’s crying on the inside at not getting the valentine she wanted, but she doesn’t want to hurt Stiles’ feelings.  
  
It’s easier to smile. 

* * *

  
Her parents are screaming at each other and she claps her hands over her ears, wishing it would just be over. It’s the same thing every night- Dad comes home late, Mom starts to cry, Dad starts to scream, and then it’s an all-out battle royal. She’s trying to ignore their fighting, trying to ignore the twisting pain in her stomach that she always gets when they fight like this. It’s not going to stop any time soon- tomorrow is Saturday and Dad is never at work on Saturdays. 

Her door opens and she sees her mother at her doorway, her eyes red.  
She doesn’t know how to react. She smiles, because smiling is the easiest thing to do. 

“What do you need, Mom?”  
“Do you think you could pack up some things for a little vacation to Grandma’s?” 

She nods, getting up with her smile still frozen on her face. Were her parents fighting about her? She picks up her soft pink suitcase from the closet, setting it on her bed.

“How long am I staying at Grandma’s?” she asks sweetly.  
“Oh,” her mom says, sniffling, “You should pack enough for a week, honey.” 

She’s confused- it’s Friday, and she isn’t on vacation next week. She never stays at Grandma’s during the school year during the school week. 

“But I have school…”  
“Grandma will take you,” she says, “Make sure you pack everything you’ll need.”

* * *

  
“For Christ’s sake, Lydia, it’s just a question, don’t cry.”

She swallows her tears, wiping her eyes. She pokes at her food sitting in his very nice apartment, the glass dining room table that he always wanted smudged on her side from her hands and wrist resting against it. She tries rubbing away the smudges when she sees her dad look at it and shake his head irritably. 

“Stop fidgeting and focus,” he snaps.

She looks over at him and smiles because that’s the only thing she can think to do. Maybe if she smiles, he won’t be so irritated. Maybe if she smiles nicely enough, he won’t make her answer. 

“I’m not sure, Dad,” she chirps, “Can I think about it?”  
“You need to think about it?” he demands, stabbing the asparagus on his plate loudly, “Life doesn’t wait for you when big decisions are on the table, Lydia. It’s simple. You want to live with me, or your mother?”  
“I…I don’t know,” she whispers, the smile crumbling as the force of his words hit her.  
“You don’t know? How do you not know?”  
“I just don’t!” she squeaks desperately, “Why can’t you and mom just move back in together?”  
“Don’t be such a child about it,” he snorts, waving his hand.

She can feel her blood boiling, her face turning red. She throws her fork down on the table, jumping at the loud sound it makes and panicking that she broke it. It’s in tact, and she glares at her father. 

“Take me home!” she shouts, folding her arms over her chest.  
“If you’re gonna live with me, then you are home.”  
“Then I want to live with mom!” she spits at him furiously, snatching her backpack off the couch. 

The car ride is silent, and she won’t look at him, but when she gets out, she turns back and gives her father a bright smile. 

“Thanks, Dad,” she says sweetly, “Dinner was great.” 

Smiling is easier than screaming at him. 

* * *

  
She examines her new braces in the mirror, sighing. The pink rubber bands don’t help, like the orthodontist said they would. They just make them more noticeable. She doesn’t think she needs anymore help making her an outcast. She comes out of the bathroom and bumps into Stiles as she tries to rush to class without being seen. 

“Hey Lydia,” Stiles says quietly, giving her a smile.

She knows that smile. That’s her smile, when it’s just easier to smile. She tucks some of her hair behind her ear. 

“Um, hi, Stiles,” she mumbles, hoping he can’t see her teeth, “How was your spring break?” 

He looks like he’s about to cry and she realizes that holy crap, nice going- Stiles’ mother just died. Mom went to the funeral last week. 

“I’m so sorry,” she says quickly, but Stiles shrugs, smiling again despite tears rolling down his face.  
“It’s okay,” he whispers, “I didn’t wanna be at home.” 

She doesn’t know what to say, and even though she can feel the smile creeping up, she shoves it down. Smiling might’ve been easier, but she knew it would hurt his feelings. 

“My Mom went,” she says nervously, “She didn’t want me to go. But I would’ve.”  
“It’s okay. I told Dad I didn’t wanna see anyone but Scott, so that’s probably why. But that was really nice of you.” 

She reaches out and touches his arm like she’s seen her mom do with her friends when they’re upset, biting her lip. Stiles looks at her and his smile becomes a little less wooden. 

“Thanks, Lydia,” he says, walking away. She feels bad that she doesn’t know how to make him feel better- he’s always been nice to her, and all she knew to do was to touch his arm. 

* * *

  
“She’s simply refusing to do her work.” 

She sinks down in the seat between her parents, kicking her legs frustratedly. She does her tests and projects and she always gets A’s. She just doesn’t see the point in doing the busy work her teachers assign. She _knows_ the information and if she _proves_ she knows on her tests, then what does the homework matter?

“Is she failing?” Her dad demands, “I won’t have her failing.”  
“No, she has perfect scores on all her tests and projects. Technically, those perfect scores are just enough to eek by with a pass. At 67 percent. In fact, Lydia seems to have figured out the _exact amount_ of work she has to do in every one of her classes in order to get a 67.”  
“She always has been good with numbers,” her mom says jokingly.

Lydia can’t help but snicker, pulling her hands in the sleeves of her sweater. 

“You find something amusing, little girl?” her father snaps, “Will this impact her GPA? Her high school GPA, that is, the one that matters.”  
“Well no, she’ll pass and get into 9th grade, and that’s when we start counting her cumulative performance in her GPA.” 

Her dad turns to her, his arms folded across his chest. 

“Lydia, look at me!” 

She turns to face him, smile going up, a placid mask of agreeability to disguise her irritation and disgust. 

“None of this shit next year, young lady, you hear me? This is defiance, plain and simple.”  
“Yes, Dad,” she warbles, “I promise, I’ll get perfect grades.” 

Her smile widens. Smiling is always the best place to hide. 

* * *

  
She looks in the mirror, primping and preening. Gone are her sweaters, her jeans, her tennis shoes- all her former school uniform. Gone are her days where a little eyeliner was putting on makeup. Gone is her usually frizzy hair, replaced by painstakingly conditioned and styled locks. Gone are her braces, replaced with perfect teeth, dazzlingly bright from her whitening.

She looks at herself and thinks that this is what she needed. The smile wasn’t working anymore- she couldn’t do it, she didn’t want to do it. She was tired of smiling, and she needed new armor. She twirls around, watching as the cute floral skirt spun around her, grinning. She felt like Ariel when she got her legs, just like all the people. But then she frowns, realizing that for her plan to work, she needs to give up the same thing Ariel did-her voice. She can’t let anyone know she’s smart. She can’t let anyone see the girl she is under all of this armor. Because this is her ticket to everything she wants. 

“If you want to fit in, you need to look the part. I wear a tie, a mechanic wears a jumpsuit, a police officer wears a badge. Everything has a uniform. Wear the uniform, blend in, then rise above.” 

And as she puts on her perfectly pink lipgloss, she thinks how funny that the only useful thing her ever told her was to change herself. 

She smiles, and it’s complete. Her shell is perfect. 

* * *

  
No one really recognizes her- no one but Stiles and Danny. Stiles grins at her, pointing at her mouth. 

“You got them taken off!” he says excitedly, “Your teeth look great! Not that they didn’t before-I thought your braces were cute, uh, I mean-“  
“Thanks….?” 

She doesn’t address him by name, and she forces her smile to go wooden and vacant. _Step one- new shell. Step two- distance yourself from everyone, especially losers, like you were._  
She can see the smile on his face melt away, hurt in his eyes. 

“Stiles,” he says in an injured tone.  
“Right,” she says quickly, hurrying away. That was harder than she thought it would be. She was never really friends with Stiles- he was just someone who was nice to her when no one else talked to her, she rationalized. She swallows the guilty feeling. 

She can feel the eyes on her, lifting her chin higher. All according to plan. She bumps into Jackson outside her home room, giving him a raised eyebrow. 

“Oh, I’m sorry.”  
“Lydia?” 

Her expression spreads into a grin. 

“Yes, that’s me.”  
“Holy shit, you got hot.”  
“You don’t look so bad yourself.” 

She flounces away and she can feel his eyes and hear the low whistle from one of many boys who hover around him, feeling a thousand times stronger than she could ever remember.  
_Perfect._  
She feels like she can feel her canine teeth growing into fangs with each smile, like it looks more dangerous- because now, it is. Because she controls it- not the other way around. 

* * *

  
“Smile.” 

She raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow, her lips no longer pink like they were in 9th grade. Now they’re as red as blood, rarely pulled from their perfect confines in a straight line. She doesn’t need to smile anymore, so she doesn’t. 

“What?” she demands, looking over at Jackson. He snorts, shaking his head.  
“I said, smile. What’s with the look on your face?”  
“It’s just my face,” she snaps.  
“Well, you got a bad case of resting bitchface then, babe.” 

She can feel her blood boiling, her long, red nails digging into her thigh as she reminds herself of the plan. But for once, the plan isn’t enough to keep her quiet, and her water bottle of vodka is empty.

“I don’t have anything to smile about,” she replied, “Why aren’t you smiling? Maybe you have resting dickface.”  
“Take it easy, jesus,” Jackson replies, “You’re with me. Isn’t that something to smile about?”

It’s her turn to snort, turning to look out the window. Oh yes, because Jackson was everything she ever wanted or needed- she learned very fast that Jackson wasn’t what she thought he was. He was a mess. He was needy one second, and cold the next. She had to keep up with his mood swings, and god, it exhausted her. It was like being with her father.  
She looks over and realizes that he’s expecting an answer, and if he doesn’t get the one he wants, it’ll be a fight. It’s Saturday- she’s drained from the week, she’s drained from her Friday night dinner with her father, and she can’t summon up the strength to fight.  
Smiling is easier, but that smile isn’t sweet and accommodating anymore. It looks forced and irritated, which it is. 

“Of course, babe,” she says sharply, “You’re right.” 

* * *

  
“You used to smile, and you don’t anymore,” Danny says quietly. She and Jackson got into a fight and he wouldn’t drive her home, so she asks Danny to. She wants to yell at him, but there’s a strange, knowing look in his eyes and all of her insults die in her mouth. She stares straight ahead, shrugging. 

“I don’t feel like smiling,” she said, “I’m tired of smiling.”  
“I hate half of the people at our school,” Danny replies, not looking at her, “I can’t stand them. Sometimes, I look at certain people, and I just get this white hot urge to punch them in the face. That scares me. So I’m always nice.”  
“I don’t want to be nice,” she whispers, “I tried being nice. Being nice gets you walked on. That’s why I don’t smile. I decide when I smile.”  
“You aren’t stupid,” Danny says, touching her arm, “Jackson says stuff he doesn’t mean when he’s mad.”  
“No, I’m not,” she snaps, “I’m smarter than him. I’m smarter than everyone. That’s why I have the plan.”

That’s the first time she’s ever said anything about the plan out loud to anyone. The plan was always her secret, her treasure, the one thing no one could take or change because they didn’t know about it. 

“I know.” 

She looks over at Danny, half furious and half awed. 

“How-“  
“I’m not stupid either,” he replies perfunctorily, “I knew it the minute we started 9th grade. You changed in a lot of ways that summer.” 

She’s blushing and avoiding his gaze- of course someone saw through her. She lets out a long, slow sigh. 

“I care about Jackson,” she says. Danny nods.  
“I know.”  
“He’s just so…”  
“Exhausting?”  
“Yeah,” she says with a laugh, “That’s a word for it.”  
“I get it,” he responds, nodding, “I won’t say anything.” 

She smiles at him and he shakes his head. 

“You don’t need to smile, Lydia. It won’t make a difference- we have the same smile.”  
“No, this one is real,” she says quickly, “Because this is the first time in a long time that I actually believe something someone has said to me.” 

* * *

  
_“I've decided to drop some of the dead weight in my life, and you're just about the deadest.”_

She’s sitting alone in her car, in the middle of fucking nowhere, just trying to figure out what she was gonna do. How dare he- how dare he! She had given him….so much of herself, she might’ve even loved him, and this was what she got in return?  
She looks over at her phone buzzing away, seeing Danny’s number popping up.  
_Oh great, Danny knows._  
It wasn’t as if she expected him not to know- Danny seems to have a sick sixth sense about her and Jackson.

She turns off her phone, throwing it on the floor as she cries, turning the volume up on her radio. She’s bawling her eyes out, screaming at no one and nothing in particular. She hates him. She hates him so much it hurts- or does she love him? She has no idea, but all she knows is this fucking bullshit hurts and she can’t take it. 

She’s flailing furiously, her slender fists pounding against her steering wheel, her legs kicking uselessly. She knows she looks fucking insane, and she doesn’t care. She feels fucking insane, and she doesn’t care. She feels like she did when she was in 8th grade, like she wants to rip the world apart and set it on fire because it’s so stupid and shitty and she can’t take another day like this. 

She cranks the car to life, rolling down the windows all the way and screaming down the road, her music blasting. She lets out another furious scream as she feels like she’s going warp speed, it devolving into a laugh.

_Of course. Of course this is what happened._

She slows down, stopping as her cries become hysterical laughter. 

What does this matter? Why should she care? He’s falling apart- he’s not part of the plan anymore. She doesn’t need him. It’s incredibly freeing, that realization. The realization that she loves him, but she doesn’t need him. She’s fine. She’ll be fine. She’ll figure it out, like she always does. 

* * *

  
She’s blasting Paper Planes, singing along, heart shaped red sunglasses on her face, lips plump and red- she’s got her war paint on, singing along with the song her hair whipping in the breeze.  
She looks over at the pile of his crap next to her, all in various states of destruction. She had a great time, defacing all of his shit, and she’s gonna give it back to him.

Every. Last. Bit. Of it.

He thinks Danny is coming over. He’s waiting to hear a honk to meet him. She feels a little guilty, stealing Danny’s phone, but she’ll make it up to him. But he ruined her plan, he humiliated her, and she plans to do the same thing to him. She rolls up to his house, laying on the horn. She grins as he comes out, grabbing his crap and standing through the sunroof on her mom’s SUV, waving at him. 

“Lydia?” he yells, and she blows him a kiss, whipping his crap at his perfect lawn, laughing the whole time. He looks like he’s just been slapped in the face, just staring as she throws his shirts, his jackets. She gets back in, grabbing a shoebox next to her, hanging it out the window. She leans forward, grinning at him. 

“Smile!” she yells, “You don’t want anyone to think you’ve got resting bitchface, do you?” 

He’s dashing towards her, and she slams on the gas, letting all of the papers inside the shoebox in her hand flutter behind her like a flock of birds and her smile falls away, replaced by an angry look on her face.

She hums along, her finger miming shooting along with the chorus.  
“And never smile again,” she sings.

She likes her version better. 


End file.
